


Shred

by Throat



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man - All Media Types, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Blackmail, Loss of Control, M/M, Public Humiliation
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-01-03
Updated: 2018-07-18
Packaged: 2019-02-27 20:03:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,346
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13255620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Throat/pseuds/Throat
Summary: It was only a matter of time before Peter was caught in that alleyway.(NB: this story is headed somewhere dark. If you're on the lookout for trigger warnings, i suggest you skip this one. For those that stay, I don't want to spoil the plot by specifying exactly which triggers may be involved, but be warned that you're reading this at your own peril.)





	1. Trace

Gooseflesh. If he’d promoted the sensation to conscious thought at the time, he might have been able to do something before things had spiralled so nightmarishly out of control. He might have been able to stop what was about to happen.

Back in that alley, though, he hadn’t hesitated. He hadn’t even noticed as he slipped off his Spider-Man suit, leaving him clad only in tattered boxers that he had owned since he was eleven. He hadn’t given it a moment’s thought as he’d tugged his jeans back on that someone else might be there. That someone might be watching.

And Peter was the one watching now. His stomach flipped as the video played back on his phone, sent from an unknown number, without message or explanation. His half-naked body was slowly redressing on screen, damning and unmistakeable evidence of his alter ego. Fuck. 

In hindsight, it was probably his backpack that had done it. Leaving it strung up to a dumpster with spider silk was pretty fucking stupid, now that he thought about it. It was only a matter of time before someone found it. Before they decided to wait for its owner to return. 

Peter’s breathing grew shorter as the video kept playing, finishing with him turning towards the camera and giving a clear shot of his face before the screen went black. In the silence that followed, he felt like a clamp was being tightened around his lungs, each second ratcheting up the pressure until he could barely breath. His hands were shaking as he tapped out his reply, demanding the identity of whoever had sent him the video.

Nothing.

He clenched the phone and swore, waiting for a response from his mystery videographer. The seconds ticked on in agonising slowness as he stood there, helplessly staring at the four-inch screen and cursing himself for being so goddamn stupid. 

_Fuck!_

He threw his phone against the wall in a flash of anger, searing rage overcoming him in an instant. He felt almost sick with it, sick, dizzy and hysterical. The urge to lash out and start breaking things grew stronger, his senses whipped into a frenzy by teenage hormones and the powers pulsing under his skin. 

In the corner of his vision, Peter saw his phone screen light up as it smacked onto the floor. He briefly wondered if the impact had broken something when the phone vibrated twice, causing him to snap his head towards it. _New message._

The anger dissipated as suddenly as it had come on, leaving only fear and tightly coiled nerves in its place. Peter shut his eyes for a moment, his mind jumping to hundreds of conclusions about who could have recorded the video and what they could want from him. His lips felt cracked and dry as he brushed them with his tongue, wondering what the fuck he should do. 

He lurched towards the phone and picked the device off the carpet, putting in his passcode twice after his shaking fingers fucked up the first attempt. The new message popped onto the screen and his stomach dropped like he had swallowed a brick.

**I have you by the balls Peter Parker.**

_FUCK._

He drew blood as his teeth bit into his lip, hand clenching uselessly around his phone. A wave of nausea rolled over him and he stumbled backwards, his legs finding the edge of the bed before he toppled onto it. This had to be some kind of nightmare. His eyes began to swim with furious, helpless tears as he let out a long string of expletives. How could he have been so fucking dumb? He had put everyone at risk, what if the bastard did something to Aunt May-

The phone buzzed in his hand again, cutting short his train of thought.

**If you don’t want your identity becoming public knowledge, download the TRACER app to your phone and send me your login details.**

TRACER? Peter had never heard of it. Feeling the nausea in his stomach intensify, he typed the word into the app store and waited for the results to return. 

The first icon that popped up was a stylised eye with a bright red iris, the reflection painted to look like light bouncing off a camera lens. He felt the bile rise in his throat as he read the description.

_TRACER allows you to track your phone to within a two foot radius, remotely activate the microphone and camera and access all files, photos, videos and music on the device even when the phone is not in your possession._

Was this some sort of sick joke? Peter threw his phone across the room a second time, part of him hoping it would smash into a million pieces and the nightmare would be over. The phone clattered feebly onto the floor beneath his desk and Peter clenched his hands into fists, resting them on his knees. He stood up and stepped towards the device, but then turned back around, hands clenching and unclenching uselessly at his sides. He paced around his room a few times, wondering what the fuck he should do. 

His face scrunched up, agonising in the decision he was being forced to make. Minutes passed as he debated with himself, wondering if he should capitulate, if there was anything he could do to stop it happening. After another five minutes, the muscles in his face finally relaxed, a calm settling over him as he reached for the phone and began to type in his reply. For all of the agony swirling around inside of him at the forced decision, there was only one choice he was willing to make. Only one option.

**There is no way in hell I’m downloading that app, I’m not playing along with whatever sick, twisted game you have in mind.**

He hit send before he could lose courage and change his mind. He closed his eyes and tried to quell the feeling of dread in his stomach as he waited for a response. 

After five minutes, he had still heard nothing and began to fear the worst. He contemplated sending another text, offering to do something else for the blackmailer instead, but quickly shot down that idea. If his identity was going to be outed, then he would just have to find a way to deal with it. 

The seconds dragged by until another half hour had passed without word from the blackmailer. Aunt May returned home from work and Peter had dinner with her, doing his best to pretend like nothing was wrong. When he checked his phone after the meal, there was still no reply.

Was the blackmailer bluffing? Would they really go through with it and out him to the world? Or had they chickened out?

For the few hours before bed, Peter obsessively checked his phone and googled ‘Spider-Man’ to look for news stories or any new results. At twelve thirty, there was still no word from his blackmailer and he decided to try and get some sleep before school the next day.

He closed his eyes beneath the covers but found sleep to be evasive. As he tossed and turned in bed, he couldn’t stop his mind conjuring up all sorts of awful scenarios about what tomorrow would bring. Every time he felt himself begin to drift off, he awoke with a start and had to check his phone to see if there were any messages and type ‘Spider-Man’ into google one more time. 

At 3.30am there was still nothing.

At 4.30am he let out a deep moan and cursed the fucker that was blackmailing him, wishing he could meet him in person and show him that Spider-Man was not to be fucked with.

Peter was already awake the next morning when his alarm went off, feeling like he hadn’t slept more than ten minutes. The dread in his stomach was stronger than it had been last night, the lack of sleep making everything seem much worse in the grim light of dawn. He checked google again as he got dressed and found nothing, so he trudged into the kitchen to make himself some cereal.

The morning passed without incident as he left the appartment, making his way down to street level so he could begin the walk to school. Each step filled him with more nerves and dread, the uncertainty about what was going to happen weighing him down and making him want to cry. He wasn’t exactly sure why, but something in him was dreading the school day, as if he already knew that something terrible was about to happen to him.

He was five minutes away from school when it happened. His phone went off in his pocket, and Peter let out a shriek as he felt it buzz against his leg. He snatched it into his hand and feared the worst, typing in his passcode as quickly as he could and opening the new message.

**Hot.**

What the fuck? Peter frowned as he looked at the one-word text, trying to decipher the cryptic message. Did the message mean he was getting closer to something, getting warmer? That he was in danger?

It hadn’t come from the same person as last night, either. As he was contemplating what it could mean, the phone buzzed again, a text coming from a third unknown number.

**Fucking Freak.**

Peter stopped walking as he read the text, caught completely off guard. What was happening? Had they found out that he was-

 **Sexy picture!**

The fourth message was accompanied by a winky face and an aubergine emoji, and Peter felt the ground fall out from beneath him. His stomach crunched into a ball of pure dread as he began sprinting towards the school, pushing through the students milling outside the gates before first period. As he raced up the front steps, Peter shoved the phone back into his pocket as he felt it vibrate against him with a fifth message. 

He saw it as he reached the front entrance, stopping abruptly in his tracks.

His faced scrunched up in horror as his eyes took in the photo, and he quickly snatched the poster down, ripping it off the wall and crumpling it into a ball. How many people had seen it before he had got to it? How many fucking people? 

His phone buzzed again against his thigh, almost in defiance.

“Looking sexy Peter,” a boy to his left sneered, and he suddenly realised that everyone around him had stopped walking and was staring. The blood rushed to his face, and he looked for the nearest exit – inside the school. His words failing him, Peter spluttered helplessly at the boy before ducking into the front of the building, but as soon as the door swung shut behind him he stopped dead in his tracks. 

They were _everywhere._

Someone had plastered the school with the posters, pinned them to every noticeboard, stuck them onto random lockers, left spares littering the floor. Peter felt humiliation like he had never known as he gaped at the corridor, the blood rushing to his face as more students turned to giggle or stare at him. 

Peter shut his eyes and wanted to crawl into a hole in the ground.

That fucking _bastard!_

He hadn’t been outed as Spider-Man. No, Peter had been outed as something else instead.

Peter looked down at the crumpled poster in his hand, identical to the hundreds of other posters plastered around the school. It was a printout of one of the video stills, showing him in that alleyway, wearing-

Peter couldn’t even think it without wanting to vomit. It was a picture of him in only his boxers, his old, plaid boxers that were a few sizes too small for him and left _very_ little to the imagination. Every inch of his body was exposed in the still, captured in high definition. He was even looking somewhere near to the camera, as if the photo had been- _as if it had been posed._

Peter made an involuntary, animalistic grunt in his throat as his eye traced the rest of his body in the nearest poster, and his cheeks flushed even hotter. 

_Why the fuck hadn’t he worn nicer boxers that day?!_ He cursed himself as he saw there was a visible… _outline_ … in the thin boxers in the particular video still that had been printed off. Peter was certain that it had been done on purpose.

His cheeks were burning with shame, hot, unmistakeable humiliation rolling over him in waves like he had never felt before. Last night he had feared being outed as Spider-Man, but somehow in his mind he hadn’t thought about the fact that his blackmailer had captured him _almost naked_ on film in that alleyway as he’d changed. His eyes pricked with tears, and he did everything he could to desperately hold them back.

That wasn’t even the worst part, though. For the first time, Peter dragged his eyes away from the photo and found the writing printed in bold, black letters underneath. Scrawled across each poster were the words ‘Sexy orphan boi looking for a daddy, text me at 917 154 23432 for more revealing photos ;)’.

Peter was fucking speechless. Not only had been outed as- as _gay_ , but- 

Words completely failed him. He couldn’t believe that on top of everything else, his blackmailer was using his _dead parents_ just to twist the knife even deeper, just to make sure that his humiliation was absolute. A tear escaped and rolled down his left cheek, and Peter turned and bolted.

“Peter Parker!” a deep voice barked out as he raced back out the front of the school, a primal instinct urging him to run past the hundreds of students turning and gaping at him, urging him to escape. 

He kept running, block after block after block, tears streaming down his face and his cheeks still burning with shame. He lost count of how many blocks he had run as he finally slowed down to pant, wiping the sweat from his brow. He lifted his phone back up, and amongst the fifteen – FIFTEEN! – texts from new unknown numbers, he saw he had a new message from his blackmailer.

**That was a warning Peter. Download the app or I will ruin your life every single day until you are nothing but a shred of a boy.**

A moment passed before the phone buzzed again.

 **Aunt May gets the poster next.**

A new feeling of humiliating helplessness swept over him, and his hand clenched tightly around the phone until his knuckles were white. His mind was in a frenzy, nostrils flaring with every breath and his teeth biting into each other as the panic attack rolled over him.

“FUCK!” he swore, kicking the nearest wall, hard, knowing he was completely and utterly fucked. He was screwed. Cornered, trapped, humiliated beyond belief, with no way out.

At that moment he fucking wailed, a pathetic, thin shriek escaping from him as something changed, something caved within him and he knew there was only one thing he could do. A single thought flashed across his panicked mind as he pulled out his phone and opened up the app store. 

_Make it stop._

He took a breath to steady himself and shut his eyes as he hit download. When he reopened them, the red eye of TRACER was staring up at him in cold detachment.

He opened the app and copied the remote login credentials to the clipboard, pasting them into a new message. The will to resist it or keep fighting had been completely extinguished inside him. Even after all of his embarrassment, this last step felt the most humiliating. Felt the most like a defeat.

Feeling like a spider trapped inside a jar, his finger found the button and hit send.


	2. Spoil

Peter stared down at the phone in his hand, waiting for a light to flicker on, his screen to change, some sign that the blackmailer was accessing his device. But as he gripped the phone in those tense moments of silence, there was nothing.

The coil of dread tightened in his stomach as he was left to stew in the quiet, the moment’s reprieve giving him time to comprehend what he had just done, what he had just allowed to happen. His eyes flickered upwards towards the camera on the top of his phone and Peter wondered whether the blackmailer had already switched it on, whether he was already being _watched._

The thought sent a vicious shiver down his spine, and his face crumpled in something approaching despair. It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t fucking fair! He had only made one mistake, it wasn’t right that he should lose everything, that his whole life should get fucked from the very first time he messed up.

Peter felt tears prick at his eyes again and had to stomp down on the feeling, hard. He wasn’t allowing himself to be that pathetic. He could at least try to put on a brave face, try and be the person people thought Spider-Man was.

The phone buzzed in his hand, and Peter sucked the air between his teeth.

**Why so sad? ;)**

Peter scowled at the device, feeling a surge of anger flare up inside of him at being toyed with by the bastard. He also felt his stomach churn, a distinct unease creeping over him with the confirmation that his blackmailer was watching. Something about it just felt so perverse, so _wrong_ , and Peter felt like he was about to throw up.

Taking a deep breath to steady himself, Peter did his best to school his features into impassivity. He wasn’t going to give his blackmailer the satisfaction of knowing just how deeply he was getting under Peter’s skin. He wasn’t going to let this fucker break him.

Peter unlocked his phone and began typing out his reply.

**What the fuck do you want with me?**

Peter looked at the message for a second, wondering if he should hit send. Was it worth antagonising the blackmailer, just to make a show of bravado? To try not to look so damn weak and pathetic?

After a moment’s internal debate, Peter decided better of it. He began erasing the swearword from his message, knowing it wasn’t smart to risk further retaliation. At this point, he wasn’t sure he could take it.

**My my, who knew Peter Parker had a potty mouth.**

Peter froze as he received the text, delivered before he had even had a chance to hit send on his own message. He felt his cheeks flush as he realised the blackmailer had full access to his phone, and he could obviously see the message Peter was typing without him having to hit send.

**What do you want with me?**

Peter hit send on his edited message anyway, hoping to distract the blackmailer from the swear and keep the conversation moving. Unfortunately, it didn’t look like luck was on his side.

**I want you to show me the proper respect, Parker. You’re not going to talk to me with that potty mouth. I’ll make sure of it.**

Peter clenched his jaw as he tapped out his reply, fighting the urge to snarl.

**Sorry, it won’t happen again.**

He waited for the next message to come through, his fingers tapping nervously on the back of the phone.

**No. Not good enough.**

Fuck. His stomach clenched as he read the short message, his pulse racing with the fear of what was coming.

**I think it’s time someone taught you a lesson about how to use that filthy fucking mouth of yours.**

Peter swore under his breath, before choking out a gasp as he realised the blackmailer could access the microphone in his phone too.

**I’m sorry, I’ll be more carefu-**

He didn’t have time to finish typing the message before the next one came through.

**Kiss the ground.**

“Excuse me?” he questioned aloud, wondering what the fuck his blackmailer was talking about. It was barely five seconds before the reply flashed on his phone.

**You heard me. Kiss the fucking ground Peter. Get that dirty mouth of yours on that dirty fucking pavement.**

“I’m not doing that!” he cried out indignantly, clenching the phone tight enough in his hand that his knuckles were turning white. He looked around him at the people walking past him on the street, his cheeks flushing as he desperately hoped no one had heard his outburst.

**You will fucking do whatever I tell you to do.**

Peter let out a low moan as he gripped the phone to his side, pacing back and forth as his mind went into overdrive. He abruptly stopped and held the phone back up to his face so he could speak into the microphone.

“I can’t do that, there are people around!” he whispered, eyes darting to a man passing by on the other side of the street.

He clenched the phone again, waiting for the reply to come.

**You should have thought of that before you ran your potty mouth at me.**

Peter snarled at the message and kicked at a join between two slats in the pavement, desperate for something to lash out at. After another moment of frantic pacing he paused, steadying himself.

“I won’t do it again, I promise!” he pleaded, hating how his voice rose to a whine at the end of the sentence. There was nothing Peter hated more than being made to feel pathetic and he was furious that his blackmailer was reducing him to this.

**You have ten seconds to do it.**

Peter’s eyes widened and his stomach dropped like a lead balloon.

**10.**

“Please, this is so-”

**9**

“Not fair, I only swore once-”

**8**

“Goddamn it!”

**7**

Peter looked around the street, there was no one on his side of the road but a couple were slowly walking towards him on the opposite side, maybe 35 feet away.

**6**

“I’ll do it after those people walk past-”

**5**

“Stop counting!” he gasped, his pulse skyrocketing and his Spidey senses going haywire.

**4**

“FINE! I’m doing it!”

**3**

Peter dropped down onto all fours on the pavement and held the phone out so that the camera could watch him. He knew his cheeks were bright red as he leaned his face towards the floor, feeling more embarrassed and helpless and pathetic than he had in his entire life. His lips touched the pavement and a strangled moan came out of his throat, knowing that some part of him had just been violated. That something inside of him had just been lost and would probably never be regained.

He brought himself back to his feet, more slowly this time, trying to fight the deep feeling of humiliation and discomfort in his chest. The guy and the girl on the opposite side of the road were looking at him as they walked past, and his cheeks flushed an even deeper colour as he hoped the angle hadn’t been right for them to see him press his lips onto the pavement. He forced himself to look away towards the building behind him as he felt the urge to curl up into a ball and die.

Peter took in a deep breath and steeled himself before looking back at his phone. The two words he saw on his screen made the bile rise in his throat and his face crumple.

**With tongue.**

“No! Don’t make me do this, please don’t make me do this, anything but that. Please!” he pleaded, praying to whatever god was out there that his blackmailer would listen. “I already kissed it, isn’t that enough. Those people fucking saw me, that has to be enough, don’t make me do it again!”

The pause before the next message came through was so long that Peter had started to wonder whether his blackmailer would reply at all.

**Get that fucking sewer mouth onto the ground Parker and get your tongue on the pavement. If you make me tell you to do it one more time, you’re fucking outed as Spider-Man. No more warnings.**

The despair rose in Peter again and tears pricked furiously at his eyes. This was it, then. He wasn’t being given a fucking choice. He was entirely helpless, completely fucking vulnerable and at the total mercy of whatever fucked up things his blackmailer wanted to make him do next. He would just have to do it and hope the misery ended soon.

Peter looked around the street nervously once again, his vision swimming as his mind struggled to come to terms with what was happening to him. He felt a mild relief that for once there was no one close by, so at least no one would be witnessing this humiliation.

His cheeks were scarlet as he sank back to the floor, dropping himself back onto all fours. He propped the phone up against the wall of the building next to him and faced it, his stomach clenching with dread at what was about to happen.

Taking a deep breath, Peter looked down at the dusty pavement beneath him. This was where people walked on their way to work every single day, where they trampled on their way to the store, where the grime and muck from their shoes left little marks and specks of dirt as they passed.

And he was going to have to put his tongue on it.

This was worse than any humiliation he had endured from Flash, worse than any of the bullying. The way he felt inside, being made to do this, it made him sick to his core. There were no words to describe the utter humiliation of it. The shame.

A tear rolled down his cheek as he lowered his lips to the ground and began to kiss the sidewalk.

It tasted cold and a little like earth as he pressed his tongue against it in slow, lapping motions, before pressing his lips and his mouth down onto the pavement. He made small kissing noises as he kept going, trying to push down the revulsion that was rising up in him. He could feel small particles of dirt and mud on his tongue, and Peter had the sinking feeling that this moment was being burned into his memory, that he would be tasting pavement for the rest of the day no matter how many times he brushed his teeth or used mouthwash. He had never even kissed a person before today, and now he was being forced to spoil himself, to put his lips on the _goddamn ground_ -

Peter jumped as a car horn blasted out behind him, and he shot back up to his feet faster than a natural human would have been able. He knew his face was bright crimson as the car drove past him, and he was thankful that the sunlight reflecting off of the windshield was occluding the face of the driver who had just seen him making out with the fucking floor.

Peter snatched the phone back up and began walking. He didn’t know where he was going, but he just had to get out of this awful street. This street where he had been _defiled_.

Once he was a block away from where it had happened, he let out a pent-up moan. His mind was struggling to process what he had just been made to do and he was trying not to go into shock, fighting the feeling of utter humiliation churning in his stomach and the nausea that was making his vision blur. Peter’s eyebrows knit together and he felt another whimper come out of his throat as he struggled to keep his composure.

It was another few minutes before he had steadied himself enough to chance another look at his phone. There were no new messages. His blackmailer, for whatever reason, was silent.

Peter paused on the side of the street, unsure of what to do. He waited a few more moments for a message to come through, his mind filling in the blanks of what the next awful command might be. But after another restless minute, he couldn’t help himself.

“Why are you doing this to me?” It came out of Peter like a high-pitched moan, containing every moment of the awful act he had just been forced to commit. It was seconds before his blackmailer sent the response.

 **Because you deserve it**.

Peter looked at the phone, flabbergasted. Of all the things he could be accused of, of all the things _Spider-Man_ could be accused of-

“What could I possibly have done to deserve this?” He asked, the indignance clear in his voice despite his efforts to sound neutral.

**No. Not what you’ve done.**

Peter looked at the message, wondering what his blackmailer was getting at. After a moment’s pause, he opened his mouth to ask “Then why-”

**What you are.**

He frowned at the three words.

“What I am?” He asked, uncertainty creeping into his voice. As far as explanations went, this one was only raising more questions in the teenager’s mind.

**You deserve every second of this because of what you are.**

Peter’s mouth tightened as he read the message, feeling something ugly starting to take root in his stomach.

“Because I’m Spider-Man? A superhero?” He asked tentatively after another moment’s pause.

**No. Superpowers are something you have, not something you are.**

“Then what am I? What is it about me that means I deserve to suffer?” He asked, his voice cracking at the end of the sentence. He really fucking hated himself for how pathetic he had just sounded, how much like a _victim_. But something inside him needed an answer, needed a way to process everything that was being done to him.

**You deserve to suffer because you are worthless.**

Peter looked at the message and felt a sudden surge of anger flare up in him as he clutched the phone in a death grip.

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” He spat, unsure of quite why the text was making him so furious.

**You’re not a normal boy and you know it. You are worthless. A small, dirty thing. About as low as a human can get whilst still having an identity of its own.**

Peter clenched his jaw as his anger deepened, feeling himself beginning to see red.

“I help people, I’m a hero!” he spat, the fury palpable in his voice. “I don’t deserve one second of this!”

**Liar. You pretend to be a hero, but we both know the insides don’t match the outsides.**

Peter bristled, fighting the urge to smash the phone against the wall until it shattered into a million pieces.

“And just what is wrong with me then, hmm?” He shouted, not caring if anyone else on the street could overhear.

**You already know that Peter. Deep inside you can feel it, the taint. You’re spoiled inside. A rotten creature.**

Peter felt his eyes prick with furious tears, only this time he wasn’t sure whether it was the fury or anguish that was making his eyes wet. His voice cracked as he bit out a reply, the anger of his tone somehow ringing hollow to his own ears.

“No! I’m not- I’m not _spoiled_. I _help_ people, goddamn it! I do good things for them-”

**Do you think Captain America would allow himself to be made to put his tongue on the fucking sidewalk?**

The question startled Peter, abruptly cutting across his train of thought. For once, he didn’t have a good answer.

“I- I-” he started, before trailing off into silence as his mouth kept opening and closing around words that failed to materialise.

**You’re unfit to be a hero. You’re the furthest thing from it.**

The force of the words struck Peter like a physical blow.

“That’s not fair, you didn’t give me a choice!” he whimpered, his heart hammering in his chest.

**You licked that floor because deep down you know you deserved it. That you deserve to be made low. That you deserve to be humiliated. Deserve to be shamed.**

“No,” he said in a quiet voice, not wanting to read any more of the awful messages. “That’s not true.”

By now the fight was draining out of him, his anger had subsided and was being replaced with something else, a feeling he couldn’t begin to put words to.

**There is nothing I could make you do that would be half as sick as you already are inside.**

“Stop,” he said quietly, his voice cracking.

**You brought this on yourself Peter. You knew it was just a matter of time before someone discovered what you really are.**

“Stop it.” Tears were rolling down his cheeks, and he knew the fight had been taken out of him.

**What would Aunt May think if she knew the real you? If she could see the filth inside that you try so desperately to keep hidden from her?**

Peter sucked in a breath as his hands started to shake.

**What would Tony Stark think, if he knew who Spider-Man really was?**

“That’s enough!” he moaned, hoping the blackmailer would stop saying these awful fucking things to him.

**Oh Petey, I’m just holding up a mirror. If you don’t like what you see in your reflection, it’s not my fault.**

“Ok I get it! Stop,” he cried out desperately, and for once it seemed like his blackmailer was listening to him. There was a pause in the messages, perhaps his blackmailer giving him a moment to compose himself, a moment’s reprieve. Or maybe his blackmailer was just giving him enough time to let the truth of the words sink in.

Peter’s phone buzzed again with a new message, an address, maybe twelve blocks away. Peter sucked in a breath to try and steady himself before he started walking.

He walked in silence for the next few blocks, keeping the phone down by his side. He felt flustered and agitated, unsure of how to even begin processing what had just happened. He tried his best to put his blackmailer’s words out of his mind, but they were dragging him down like a weight resting heavily on his shoulders.

As he began drawing closer to his destination, Peter felt the nerves redouble in his stomach. Just what did his blackmailer have in store for him this time? Surely it couldn’t be worse than having his semi-naked body posted around school for everyone to see, right?!

He found himself chewing his bottom lip again, a nervous habit that the day wasn’t doing anything to abate. His mind was racing with the possibilities of where he could be being sent, but he didn’t dare voice any of the awful ideas flashing across in mind.

Peter was a block away from his destination when he first saw the sign. He raised the phone to look at the screen as he approached closer, double-checking that he had the correct address. Peter tried to hold back the surge of relief welling in the pit of his stomach as the store came into view, along with a small note of confusion.

Peter came to a halt and looked up at the building he was standing in front of.

 “Starbucks?” He asked, trying to keep the hope out of his voice.


	3. Rot

**Go inside. Up to the counter.**

Peter forced himself to relax as he followed his blackmailer’s orders, walking towards the front doors of the café. How bad could it really be if his blackmailer was sending him here? Nothing that terrible had ever happened in a Starbucks, right?

Peter pushed open the glass door and stepped into the cool, air-conditioned café. The aroma of freshly ground coffee wafted around him and offered him some small comfort on what had been, on any count, one of the worst days of his life. His eyes scanned over the other customers, looking for anyone he knew as Peter walked up to the counter. There didn’t seem to be anyone here that he recognised, and Peter was immensely thankful for the fact.

“What’ll you have?” 

The deep voice broke Peter out of his thoughts and his eyes snapped up to the barista, a tall, blonde man who towered over Peter’s 5 foot 8 frame. A part of him couldn’t help but notice that the guy looked a little like Captain America with blonde, pushed back hair and those all-American bright blue eyes.

Peter stared at the man for a moment and opened his mouth to respond, before realising his blackmailer hadn't told him what to order. His cheeks coloured as he looked back down at his phone, hoping the barista wouldn't notice his strange behaviour.

**Order a Unicorn Frappuccino with raspberry syrup, whipped cream, sprinkles and extra pink fairy powder.**

Peter grit his teeth as he read the message, the wave of humiliation already starting to wash over him. “You can’t be serious,” he muttered to himself.

**And a slice of cake.**

“What was that?” the barista asked, and Peter’s eyes immediately shot back to him as his cheeks blushed even deeper.

Peter swallowed and decided to just get it over with. He pointedly looked at his phone to make it clear that he wasn’t choosing this for himself, hoping the barista would think the drink was for someone else, like a girlfriend or a sister.

“I’ll have a, uh, unicorn frappuccino-” Peter grimaced as the words left his mouth, feeling his blush spreading to his ears, “with raspberry syrup, whip, and some, um, sprinkles, and-” Peter swallowed before saying the last part, sure his face had turned the colour of a stop sign at this point, “some extra pink fairy powder.”

Peter tried not to react to the barista's quirked eyebrow as he finished his order, the humiliation roiling uncomfortably in the pit of his stomach. There was a slight pause before the man looked ready to respond, enough time for Peter to remember the second part of his instructions.

“Oh! And a slice of cake.”

Another silence stretched between them, and Peter's lips formed into a tight line.

“And what flavour cake would you like, Sir?” the barista finally asked, his deep voice thick with something that sounded suspiciously like heavily suppressed amusement, no doubt at Peter's expense.

“Ummm,” Peter faltered, trying desperately to get the flushing in his cheeks to go down. Why was everything in his life always so goddamn embarrassing!

He looked down at his phone again and saw his blackmailer’s next message.

**Ask which cake has the most delicious frosting.**

Peter snapped the phone back down at his side and groaned, closing his eyes as the new wave of humiliation sank in. He had always found social interactions to be awkward, and this scenario was definitely not helping on that front. It was the sort of thing he’d had nightmares about as a younger teen.

“Which cake, umm, has the, err, most-” Peter had to force the next words out, his eyes looking anywhere but at the barista, “ _delicious_ _frosting_?”

Peter had no idea how his blackmailer was doing it, but he was somehow managing to push all of Peter’s most humiliating buttons, feeding off of his worst insecurities.

“Perhaps you would enjoy the valentine cake,” the barista smirked, almost purring the word ‘valentine’ at Peter.

Fucking hell, Peter wanted to die.

“And a slice of valentine cake please,” he finished in a monotone, utterly unable to meet the barista’s eyes.

“Great. What’s your name?”

“It's Peter,” he mumbled, fingers fidgeting with the hem of his t-shirt.

“That’ll be $7.95.”

Peter’s hands shook as he reached into his pocket for his wallet, and he paid for his order as quickly as he could.

He walked over to the collection point and tried not to fidget as he waited for his drink and cake. He had always hated this part, being made to awkwardly stand there at the edge of the counter while someone else made your order.

He looked down at his phone again, but there were no more messages from his blackmailer. He tapped nervously on the counter with his fingers and waited with agonising slowness as his order was prepared.

Finally, the man brought over a tray and placed it on the counter in front of Peter. The boy looked at the drink, a sparkling mess of pink and blue swirls, and a slice of what looked like red velvet cake with a red heart pressed into the cream frosting on top. He felt his cheeks flush again as he looked back up at the barista, accepting his order with a muttered ‘thanks’ as he unwittingly caught the man’s twinkling blue eyes.

Another glance at his drink revealed the source of that twinkle.

Instead of ‘Peter’, the barista had labelled the drink as ‘Petal’.

Peter had to stomp down the urge to murder something as he felt his face flush several shades darker. He sighed and looked down at his phone again, waiting for his blackmailer’s next instruction to come through.

**Grab a table in the center of the room.**

Peter scanned the café and his eyes settled on a free table in the middle of the seating area, thankfully not too close to any of the tables around it. He gingerly carried his tray over and sat down, placing the slice of cake, multi-coloured drink and his phone on the table in front of him.

His eyes started scanning the room again as his foot nervously tapped against a table leg.

 **Take a sip**.

Peter reached towards the drink and placed the straw between his teeth, sucking the fluorescent liquid into his mouth. The drink was incredibly sweet, almost sickeningly so, and Peter had to quell the nerves in his stomach to avoid the urge to throw back up the sugary liquid. How did people drink this crap?

 **And a bite of the valentine cake**.

Peter picked up his fork and cut a small piece of the red cake off, opting not to go for any of the frosting. He lifted the red sponge to his mouth and chewed on it for as short a time as possible before he could swallow, the cake tasting like moist rubber to his desensitised palette.

**Take out your earphones and plug them into the phone.**

Peter dutifully obeyed, idly wondering what kind of music his blackmailer was going to make him listen to. He pulled the white earpods out of his pocket and plugged them in, looping them over to his ears.

 **Pretend to start up a phone conversation**.

Peter’s stomach sank as he read the last order, instinctively knowing that this was headed somewhere south.

“Hi,” he said in what had to be the least convincing dialogue Peter had ever spoken. “I’m good thanks, just hanging out in Starbucks,” he added, trying to make the conversation seem a little more believable and his delivery less wooden.

**Good. Now we’re going to play a little game together.**

Peter felt unease trickle down his spine at the message, not sure whether it was his Spidey sense or just the grim certainty that he would not enjoy whatever was about to happen.

**I’m going to ask you some questions and all you have to do is answer truthfully. Out loud. In a normal conversational tone, not in a whisper.**

Peter gulped, his mind immediately firing off the most embarrassing questions he could be made to answer in public. At least there was one small reprieve though – at least no one around him would know what the questions themselves were, even if they heard Peter’s answers. Hopefully that would be enough to save him from too much humiliation.

**Why so nervous Peter? I’m sure you’ll have fun.**

“Somehow I doubt it,” he spoke, as much to keep up the illusion of the phonecall as to answer his blackmailer’s query.

**We’ll start off easy enough. What is your favourite colour?**

Peter stared at the message, wondering what his blackmailer was doing. Of all the things he could have been asked, why had this been chosen? What advantage would his blackmailer gain by knowing that?

“Blue,” Peter responded, making sure his voice was loud enough that it could be overheard. Well, that question hadn’t been so awful.

**Good. What is your full name?**

He paused again, looking to either side of himself before answering “Peter Benjamin Parker.” His Adam’s apple bobbed in his throat as he swallowed nervously, the uncertainty as to what was happening or why his blackmailer was choosing these questions suddenly feeling worse than any clear threat would have been.

**How old are you?**

“Fifteen,” he answered quickly, certain that the game was about to change at any moment. There was no way his blackmailer was going to let him off this easy, it was only a matter of time before the blackmailer changed track, before his questions sharpened.

**What colour hair do you have?**

“Brown.”

This was getting deliberately weird now. Why had his blackmailer asked him the colour of his hair when he was literally watching Peter through his phone’s camera at that very moment?

**What school do you go to?**

“Midtown School of Science and Technology, which you obviously already know. Is there a point to all of this?” He asked a little pointedly, his curiosity winning out over anxiety.

There was a longer pause this time as he waited for his blackmailer’s reply.

**How many people at your school have seen you in your boxers?**

The message hit him like a punch to the gut, and Peter’s stomach churned with a wave of nausea as he read it. Maybe this was the point of the game, maybe his blackmailer was just going to rub salt in the wound.

“Everyone,” Peter spoke, his voice halfway between a growl and a whisper.

**Everyone what?**

Peter sank his teeth into his bottom lip, knowing exactly what his blackmailer wanted from him. He chanced another look around the café before he plucked up the courage to answer.

“Everyone has seen me in my boxers. Everyone,” he spoke, his voice cracking as he said the last word.

The blackmailer let him stew in silence after that answer, giving the humiliation time to wash over Peter. It was hard to read emotion through a text message, but Peter had the distinct impression of smugness coming through the phone, of gloating victory.

The thought left a bitter taste in his mouth.

**I think it's time for Starbucks to learn a little bit about Peter Parker's sex life.**

Peter groaned as the message came through, sensing the impending humiliation. He knew he would not enjoy what was about to happen, but he also knew it was pointless trying to argue.

**Is Peter Parker dating anyone?**

Peter's cheeks reddened, and he had to fight the urge to bury his head in his arms.

"No," he answered quickly, trying desperately to think of some way to steer the conversation in a safer direction.

**Full sentences Peter.**

Peter sighed quietly before giving in to his blackmailer's demand.

"I'm not dating anyone."

**Who was the last person you dated?**

Peter paused before answering, trying to ignore the small knot of pain in his stomach that had been awakened by his blackmailer's question. It was an old insecurity, but one he had tried his best to overcome.

"I've never dated anyone," he said, sounding a little defensive despite himself.

**Poor unlovable Peter, forever alone.**

Peter snapped his eyes away from the phone, feeling the sting of comment as it prodded at something ugly. He briefly looked towards the barista stacking sandwiches in one of the display cases, trying to quell the insecurities that were rising up inside of him. 

His mood had sunk even lower by the time he looked back at the phone. 

**When was your first kiss?**

He made a small noise in the back of his throat when he read it, the taste of dusty pavement and cold earth flaring across his tongue. 

"My first kiss was 30 minutes ago," he spat, humiliation giving way to something uglier as he glared at the phone. Whoever it was had a talent for rubbing Peter up the wrong way, for making him bristle.

**Wow. Never been kissed, never been on a date. What's wrong with Peter Parker?**

Peter folded his arms as he read the message, feeling even more defensive than before. "Nothing is wrong with me," he eventually said, his voice sounding strained.

**Who does Peter Parker have a crush on?**

Butterflies erupted in his stomach and he knew he had to find some way to make his blackmailer drop the subject, and fast.

"I don't have a crush on anyone," he replied, hoping his blackmailer would believe the outright lie.

**I told you not to fucking lie to me.**

The message shot chills down Peter's spine, a reminder of how dangerous his blackmailer could be, of how short his fuse was.

"I'm not lying! I just don't have a crush on anyone. I don't date anyone and I don't want to date anyone-"

The phone buzzed before he could finish the sentence, interrupting another desperate lie. 

**Last chance Peter.**

"I'm telling the truth, I swear!" he said, trying to inject as much indignance into his tone as he could muster.  

**Fine. If you're not willing to tell me that, I'll pick something worse. How big is your cock?**

“No-” Peter spluttered indignantly, his face flushing scarlet. “I’m not saying that!” he whined, his voice turning shrill at the end.

 **You have no choice**.

Peter shook his head at the text, eyebrows knitting together in anguish. This had to be some kind of nightmare.

**Say it.**

Peter swallowed and looked around the café once more, hoping desperately that no one would hear this one. As if in answer to his prayer, the barista walked back over to him and started tidying the table right fucking behind Peter, literally inches from the back of his seat.

This couldn’t fucking be happening.

**5.**

Peter shook his head at the phone, his eyes pleading with whoever was on the other end of the lens.

**4.**

The hair on the back of Peter’s neck stood on end as the barista’s hip brushed past his arm, and the spray of a disinfectant bottle convinced Peter the man wouldn’t be leaving the table in the next three seconds.

**3.**

There was no choice. No way around it. He would have to fucking say it.

**2.**

“Five point seven.”

It was perhaps the most embarrassing sentence he had ever been made to say in his entire fucking life. If he had felt bad before-

**5.7 what?**

Peter strangled the wounded cry that rose up in his throat, cursing his fucking blackmailer with every fiber of his being. The squeaking of the barista’s cloth on the table behind him was audible and Peter knew there was no way in hell the man wouldn’t hear what he was about to say.

But he wasn’t being given a choice.

“Five point seven inches long.”

The barista made an abrupt choking sound behind him, and Peter wanted to fucking die. This was it, this was rock bottom. He couldn’t fucking believe what had just happened, what he had just been made to do.

The barista stood up and walked to the other side of the café, and Peter felt absolute mortification. There was no way the barista wouldn’t have known that Peter was referring to his… to _that_ with that measurement. It couldn’t have been anything else.

Peter felt tears stinging his eyes, the humiliation inside him morphing into something ugly and unpleasant.

**I guess they should call you ‘Spider-Boy’ instead of ‘Spider-Man’, eh?**

Peter slammed the phone down onto the table, making sure the screen was face down. He couldn’t take this any more, it was too fucking much. He just wanted it all to stop, wanted to make it fucking stop.

“I’m only 5 foot 8, so proportionally I’m not that sm-“ he caught himself before he finished the sentence, hissing at the words that had nearly come out of his mouth. His phone buzzed, and he reluctantly turned it over.

His blackmailer had sent him a picture of a crayon, and Peter’s cheeks darkened again.

“I’m 15 so it’s still, you know, got some more time to grow,” he defended himself, feeling like he could be sick at any moment.

**Whatever you say Spider-Boy.**

With a sick feeling of certainty in his stomach, Peter knew that he would remember this moment until the day he died. There were no words for how he felt in that moment, his pulse racing, humiliated beyond belief and simultaneously feeling like his stomach was filled with butterflies and with bricks.

**Or maybe you’re not a spider at all. Maybe you’re just a little worm.**

Peter grit his teeth when he read the latest message, feeling the heat rise in his cheeks again.

It was minutes before his blackmailer's next message came through, minutes in which Peter fought to quell the sickness in his stomach, to try not to vomit.

**How many times a week do you google Tony Stark?**

The question came out of nowhere. Peter involuntarily sucked the air through his teeth as he read the message, a feeling like vertigo shooting through his body.

Denial. Immediate, total denial. Nothing else would do.

“I don’t know what you-"

**Answer the question.**

A sick sort of adrenaline was being injected into his veins, sending his fight or flight response into haywire. Peter swallowed audibly, his cheeks turning a dark shade of crimson as he fought to keep his breathing under control, fought not to react to the insinuation. How the fuck had his blackmailer known? How the fuck had he figured it out?

Peter exhaled before he spoke again, trying desperately to quell the surges of anger and humiliation that were shooting through him in alternating waves. He gave one last attempt at nonchalance, one desperate attempt to collect himself as he answered in a level voice.

“Maybe once or twice a week. I have to keep up to date with what he does, since he’s my mentor and all.”

**You’ve googled him 43 times since Sunday.**

The text hit him with the force of a sledgehammer. FUCK.

Peter felt stabs of panic shooting through his stomach like someone was physically cutting into him. His cheeks were radiating with the heat of a furnace as he gaped at his phone, utterly speechless.  

This was it. His darkest fucking secret. The one thing he had hoped nobody would ever find out, his one most shameful confession.

**I have access to your phone, your apps, your messages and your internet search history.**

Peter nodded, his pulse quickening as he was reminded of just how dangerous, just how fucking brutal his blackmailer could be when he wanted. And now, his blackmailer had found the magic bullet. The perfect weapon he could use to take down Spider-Man. The one thing that would ruin his life, irreparably.

Peter’s breathing sped up, each second making him feel more unhinged, more frenzied.

**Why have you googled Tony Stark 43 times since Sunday?**

Peter shut his eyes and whimpered, feeling the vulnerability and helplessness rising back up inside him. This wasn’t fucking happening. This wasn’t happening.

“I need to keep up with what Iron Man is up to, just in case-"

He was interrupted by his phone buzzing violently in his hand.

**No. You googled Tony Stark. Not Iron Man.**

Peter’s eyes glistened with tears as he felt his escape routes being shut down, his one awful secret being pulled from him with the precision of a surgical instrument. He knew his face must look crazed at this point, as he tried desperately to hold back the awful words that his blackmailer was determined to drag out of his lips.

**Why do you have over two hundred pictures of him saved to your camera roll?**

Peter fucking whimpered when he read the message. He was mortified. Utterly fucking mortified, at the texts, at the implications of what his blackmailer was saying. A new feeling of despair rose up inside him, it was so damn fucking unfair! How did his blackmailer manage to hone in on all of his most embarrassing secrets, know them in a fucking instant-

**Say it Peter.**

Peter opened his mouth wordlessly, unable to make the sounds come out. Unable to admit to this awful thing, this secret that he had sworn he would take to the grave.

**Say it.**

This was already going so much fucking worse than Peter had ever imagined it would. His blush was now spreading down his neck onto his chest and small, strangled whimpers were bubbling out of his throat every few seconds.

“I- I can’t-" he stuttered, the gravity of the words too much for him, the weight of their implications too much for him to ever admit out loud.

**Say it. Or maybe I should say it for you. Any idea who I would tell?**

Ice shot through Peter’s veins and he moaned involuntarily as he read the last message, knowing he was fucked. There was no getting out of it, no escape. His blackmailer wouldn’t stop until he said it. He just wouldn’t fucking stop.

Peter’s eyes widened and he bared his teeth at the camera, feeling more threatened and ashamed than he ever had before in his entire fucking life. This was worse than any villain he had defeated, any criminal he had faced. This was threatening _everything_ Peter held dear, fucking _everything!_

Peter choked back a sob before he said it, those vile, poisonous words that his tormenter was determined to drag out of him.

“Because I- I like him,” he sputtered out in a rushed breath. Peter clenched his eyes shut, feeling utterly naked as he was forced to admit to his darkest secret in front of a café full of people.

His eyes snapped back open as his phone buzzed.

**Not good enough. You know what I want.**

“No!” Peter wailed, the word not even sounding like it had come from a human. “Please, don’t make me do this. Anything else. Anything. Please!” he frantically whispered at the device, voice shattering towards the end.

**I’m texting Stark right now.**

“Fuck!” he gasped, his pulse skyrocketing. “I’ll do it, I’ll fucking do it,” he spat out quietly, a tear escaping before he wiped it away in frustration. He was feeling more and more like a wild animal, feral and deranged, as his blackmailer just kept pushing him, pushing him until he fucking snapped.

“I-" Peter started in a shaky voice, another wave of something ugly and unpleasant rolling over him.

And then he did an awful fucking thing, a thing so despicable and depraved that he would never forgive himself for it. He gave voice to the sick desires inside of him, spoke the sentence that he had so desperately tried to suppress for so goddamn long.  

“I have sexual fantasies about Mr. Stark,” Peter said with his eyes clenched shut, certain that every single drop of blood in his entire body was now in his cheeks. The feeling of humiliation in his stomach was so thick that it felt like a tangible substance, a parasite snaking through his digestive tract and burdening him with its awful, cancerous weight. What the fuck had he just done? What the fuck had he just done?!

His eyes snapped open as he heard a shuffle to his left, a look of horror settling on Peter’s face as he noticed the barista cleaning one of the tables adjacent to his own. Fuck, had he heard? Had he heard Peter’s fucking confession?

Peter winced as another tear escaped his eyes, silently streaking down his left cheek. He was awful, a fucking despicable human. How could he have such twisted thoughts about his mentor, a man who had done so much for him, who had given him so much? How could he be so sick, so utterly depraved?

Peter’s head jolted as sound started blazing through his headphones.

“I have sexual fantasies about Mr. Stark, I have sexual fantasies about Mr. Stark, I have sexual fantasies about Mr. Stark-”

His blackmailer was playing Peter’s recorded confession on a loop, tormenting him with it. With a sudden lurch in his stomach, Peter knew that the stakes had just been raised – not only could his blackmailer reveal his secret identity to the world, but now he was showing Peter that he could reveal his most shameful confession to the unwitting recipient of his depravity. 

Peter wilted in his seat, the fight draining out of him. He mewed pathetically as he was forced to listen to the confession over and over again, praying that it would stop. What would Mr. Stark think of him if he ever heard those words? How could he ever forgive Peter?

Just as he opened his mouth to start begging, the sound cut out and a new text appeared on his phone.

**When was the last time you masturbated thinking of Tony Stark?**

Peter’s hand shot out to cover the screen from anyone who might be looking in his direction. His eyes darted up to the barista, but thankfully he was still cleaning the table just in front of Peter’s and wouldn’t have been able to see the phone from that angle. Thank god for that, or Peter might have died right then and there.

Peter knew he would have to answer the blackmailer’s question, and he knew he couldn’t risk lying about it. After all, his blackmailer would probably be able to challenge any lie from his internet history and call Peter out on it. And then he would be punished.

There was nothing else he could do.

“Yesterday afternoon,” he spoke quietly, looking down at his hands on the table. He had tried so hard, so _damn_ hard to suppress those urges inside him, to think about _anything_ else when he- when he-

But sometimes Peter just couldn’t help himself. His mind would keep wandering back to the man, keep visualising _scenarios_ , keep replaying Mr. Stark's deep voice in Peter’s ear, the ghost of his hand on his shoulder.

He wished he could have been stronger, that he could have controlled his urges, could have been a better person. But he wasn’t.

**Full sentences Peter.**

Peter groaned and grit his teeth, knowing that it was unavoidable at this point. The chalice was already filled with poison, everything else was just window dressing at this stage. His blackmailer may as well have been holding a knife to his throat.

Peter waited until the barista stepped away to clean another table before he spoke.

“I masturbated to Mr. Stark yesterday afternoon,” Peter bit out in a strangled voice, knowing that he was adding yet another damning audio file to his blackmailer’s collection, admitting to another of his awful depravities. Peter knew he was panting after that confession, his mind starting to work itself into a panic as he tried his best to remain calm. 

**That's fucked up. You know how twisted that is, don't you?**

"I know," Peter spoke in a quiet voice, his blackmailer's accusation holding nothing that he hadn't already told himself a thousand times over. Still, he couldn't help the shudder that ran through his body or the furious tears that swam across his vision, furious with his blackmailer for uncovering his awful secret and furious with himself for letting it happen.

**What would Stark say if he knew how sick his little hero is, how perverse? I wonder how he would react if he heard the things you beg him to do to you when you touch yourself in your bedroom at night.**

Peter sniffled as another tear rolled down his cheek, his blackmailer's words making him feel ugly and small. This, at least, Peter knew he deserved. He had earned every second of his blackmailer's condemnation with the vile and disgusting thoughts he had allowed to fester in his mind, that he had even encouraged on those days he couldn't help himself. Peter remained silent because there was nothing he could say to his blackmailer's accusations, no pleas he could raise in defence of his disgraceful actions.

 **I bet he'd hesitate before he ever touched you again. Once he knew the sick little thrill it gives you every time he pats your shoulder or touches your arm.**  

Peter whimpered as he read the message, another few tears escaping to roll down his cheeks. He did his best to try and hold himself together, to try to withstand the onslaught of ugly emotions bubbling in his stomach, churned into a frenzy by his blackmailer's words.    

**You know there's a word for that, don't you? Deriving sexual pleasure out of someone without their consent?**

"No!" Peter pleaded, his voice sounding high and strangled, "It's not like that, I promise!" 

The tears were rolling down his cheeks now as he did his best not to make any noise, to keep the sniffling to a minimum. He felt like he had been made to swallow something poisonous, like there was something tainted and wrong spreading through his chest that was making him sick to his stomach. 

**It is exactly like that. Own up to it Peter. Say it aloud.**

"Please," Peter begged, at this point not even sure what he was begging for. The crazed thoughts flashing through his mind were desperate and scattered, failing to cohere into any semblance of rational thought or action.

**Say it.**

Another strangled noise escaped Peter's throat as he read the message, the disgust he felt with himself feeling like a thick layer of grime encasing his skin. He opened his mouth to try to speak but fumbled, choking on the word that refused to pass his lips.

**Say it Peter.**

Peter shuddered in a deep breath and felt himself wilt in his chair, knowing it was inevitable. He took a few more moments to gather himself before he opened his lips around the word.

It tasted like rot as he uttered it.

"Rape."

Peter crumpled and buried his head in his arms, reaching the limit of what he was able to withstand. It was too much for him, too fucking much. He couldn't stomach another moment of this conversation, of the awful fucking things his blackmailer was saying to him.

He cried into his arms, desperate sobs escaping him despite his efforts to remain silent. What made it so awful was that every word of what his blackmailer had said was true, every second of it deserved.    

His blackmailer left him undisturbed for the next minute or so as Peter fought to regain control of himself. Eventually the tears stopped, though he didn't feel any less awful inside. 

His phone buzzed in his hand again and he was almost too afraid to look.

Thankfully it was just an address, and Peter took it as his cue to leave. He pushed the barely touched cake and drink away from him as he stood up, sniffling as he raced to get out of the building as quickly as possible.

Fucking hell, if he never stepped foot in a Starbucks again it would be too soon.


	4. Neon

Peter stood in the middle of the Nike shop, trying desperately to ignore the sensation of the store clerk’s eyes gazing a hole through the back of his head. He kept his phone trained on the racks of clothing in front of him, slowly panning the camera across so that his blackmailer could see all of the displayed sportswear, showing him everything that was in the store.

A part of him dreaded what his blackmailer might be looking for. Was it an embarrassing new outfit for Peter to wear, or maybe a piece of sports equipment that his blackmailer would come up with some creative and humiliating new use for? A flash of being made to run around the city in women’s clothing made a jolt of anxiety twist through his stomach, but Peter did his best to put the image out of his mind.

Peter’s eyes briefly met the store clerk’s as he rounded a corner into another one of the aisles. The clerk was an athletic, tanned man that Peter would have guessed to be in his early 20s, and something about the way he was looking at Peter was making the heat rise to the teenager’s cheeks. He offered the clerk an awkward smile before dropping his eyes back down to the clothes racks, painfully aware that they were the only two people in the store. Peter felt anxious at the prospect of being made the unwitting center of attention once again, but there was little he could do about it in this situation.

The boy had to stifle a yawn as he reached the end of the next aisle, the exhaustion of the day beginning to seep through the low levels of adrenaline that had been pulsing through his system since he’d woken up that morning. Peter had barely slept the previous night and the events of the day were starting to take their toll.

To put it bluntly, he was feeling more than a little drained.

Once he had passed the final rack of clothing with his phone, Peter held the device back down by his side and waited for his blackmailer’s instructions. He chanced another glance at the clerk and smiled anxiously when he saw the clerk’s eyes were still locked on him. The clerk’s eyes had barely left him since he had entered the shop, and the thought was making Peter squirm.

His phone vibrated in his hand and he broke eye contact.

**Grab the light grey compression tights and the orange compression tee, short sleeved. Get the smallest sizes of both.**

Peter’s peripheral awareness of the clerk’s gaze on him made him opt to reply over text rather than with voice.

**The smallest sizes aren’t going to fit me, they make sizes down to 13-year-olds.**

Peter had the sinking feeling that it was pointless trying to argue, but he had to at least make a token effort.

His blackmailer’s response was as predictable as it was prompt.

**Don’t make me tell you twice.**

Peter sighed and dutifully walked back over to the running apparel aisle to collect the chosen items. As he pulled the fluorescent orange compression top off of the rack, he knew it would be hopeless trying to stretch the garment over his torso – the thing looked absolutely _tiny_ , and as thin as Peter was, there was no way in hell he’d be able to fit his body into it.

The compression tights were as ridiculously small as the top, and he was certain he wouldn’t be able to get them past his thighs. But he knew his blackmailer wouldn’t be satisfied until he had seen first-hand that the clothing was too small to fit. Peter had to console himself that his blackmailer would allow him to grab the next size up after that.  

Besides, it could have been worse. At least his blackmailer hadn’t opted for the obvious choice and chosen something hot pink.

Peter looked down at his phone, waiting for the rest of his blackmailer’s shopping list to come through. After a long pause, he decided to take the initiative and send the next message himself.

**What else do I need to grab?**

Peter felt the hair on the back of his neck stand on end as the clerk’s eyes swept over him again, and he did his best to quell the butterflies that erupted in his stomach from the sensation.

**That’s it. Go to the changing room.**

Peter nervously swallowed, a fear that had slowly been crystallising in the back of his mind becoming fully realised. His fingers tapped out a hasty reply.

**I can’t just wear these, it would be obscene.**

He tried not to let the anxiety show through on his face as he hit send. He was beginning to suspect that it would just spur his blackmailer on, give him another thrill to force Peter to do something else that caused the boy visible discomfort.

**It’s no different to your Spider-Man costume.**

Peter growled under his breath at the message, feeling his stomach sink.  

“That’s completely different!” he whined, all too aware of the clerk’s eyes on the back of his head. Peter opened his mouth to say more but then reconsidered, raising the phone to type out his reply instead.

A large part of him was studiously trying to ignore the fact that he already knew how useless it was to argue, but he had to try.

**The Spider-Man suit keeps everything-**

He paused, wondering how best to phrase the message ‘ _it keeps the outline of my dick from showing through the material_ ’ in a way that wouldn’t make him flush the colour of a beetroot.

Before he could finish the message, Peter was interrupted by his blackmailer’s next text.

**Changing room. Now.**

“But-” he began to protest, before deciding better of it. Sometimes you had to choose your battles, and Peter knew his blackmailer wouldn’t give him an inch of leeway over something like this.

Peter sighed again and began stomping to the changing room, feeling the clerk’s eyes on him every step of the way. Unlike most clothing stores, the changing rooms here opened directly onto the main floor of the shop. Peter grit his teeth, wondering whether that was by his blackmailer’s design, whether he had chosen this store specifically because the cubicles were so exposed.

Peter opted for the cubicle at the end of the row, furthest from the clerk. Once inside, he felt even more exposed when he realised that the curtain hanging across the doorway stopped somewhere between knee and ankle level rather than falling all the way to the floor. It was just something silly, but the thought that he wouldn’t be completely shielded from view brought another knot of unease to his stomach, another shiver of discomfort down the back of his spine.

He did his best to put thoughts of the clerk watching him undress out of his mind, knowing it was probably just the residual paranoia from the day’s events that was making him think that way.

The phone buzzed in Peter’s hand as he was hanging up the compression gear on one of the metal hooks on the changing room wall. Peter’s eyes flicked down to read the message and his hand clenched hard enough to snap the plastic hanger.

**Make sure the curtain isn’t pulled shut all the way.**

Peter spluttered, feeling his cheeks flush a blotchy red that was half anger and half humiliation.

“I’m going to be here in my underwear, the clerk will see me!” he whined at the device, his voice coming out in that strangled, high-pitched tone that his blackmailer was so damn good at eliciting from Peter.

**At least two inches between the curtain and the wall of the cubicle.**

“Goddamn it,” he swore, pacing back and fourth in the confines of the changing room. “This is perverse, I’m 15 years old!” he said, even as his hands reached back to part the curtain just a little. He waited for another message to come through telling him that his blackmailer had reconsidered, that the teenager wouldn’t have to expose himself changing to the _entire shop floor_ , but there was nothing.

Peter’s stomach sank.

It wasn’t until his eyes flickered up to his reflection that he realised the worst part of his blackmailer’s instructions. The changing room was covered by floor-to-ceiling mirrors on three sides, and Peter had a sinking suspicion that whatever angle the clerk could see into the changing room through those two inches of space, the mirrors would end up revealing a whole lot more of Peter’s body than he was comfortable with.

**It’s still better privacy than an alleyway.**

Peter bristled at the reminder, fighting the urge to swear at his blackmailer. He sighed one last time before beginning to get changed, determined to get this over with as quickly as possible.

He placed the phone down on the small stool that had been provided in the changing room and stacked his wallet and keys next to it, leaving his bag on the changing room floor. His hands fumbled as he pulled his hoodie and t-shirt off and folded them next to his backpack, leaving him shirtless in the middle of the cubicle. He glanced at himself in the mirror briefly and had to fight down a flush of embarrassment at seeing himself undressed, with his too-lean torso and disproportionately long limbs.

After another steadying breath, Peter hooked his fingers into the top of his jeans and began sliding them down his thighs. A moment later they were folded next to his hoodie and he was left in his dark red boxer briefs, patterned with–

Peter wasn’t going to think about the pattern on his boxers.

He snatched the grey compression tights off of the hanger, eager to get this part over with as quickly as humanly possible. He lifted one leg to begin sliding his foot into the ridiculously tight material, pausing only when he heard his phone vibrate on the stool.

**Lose the boxers.**

Peter stumbled as he saw the screen and immediately lost his balance, slamming hard into the wall of the cubicle. He struggled to regain his footing and frantically snatched the phone off of the stool, raising it to his mouth so he could hiss angrily into the microphone.

“No way. Not a damn chance, I’m not doing that. You’ve crossed the limit,” he said, pouring as much indignation into his voice as he could muster.

There were some things that Peter would outright refuse to do, whatever threats his blackmailer made, consequences be damned. And exposing his naked body was one of them.

**It wouldn’t be the most perverse thing you’d done.**

Peter felt the temperature of his blood drop a few degrees cooler, his thoughts crystallising into something approaching an icy clarity.

“I am a minor. I am not letting you record me getting naked,” he spoke in a chill whisper.

**You’d do it for Stark.**

Peter had to clench his teeth as the message made him seethe, his blackmailer’s words prodding at something ugly. His lips pressed into a thin line as he prepared to reply.

“I am not having this convers-”

**You’d spread your legs for him and moan as he filmed you, his obedient slut.**

Peter was rendered speechless as the heat burst into his cheeks, the visceral image flashing across his mind with potent vigour. He felt a small thrill _pulse_ somewhere downstairs as he read the text, a reaction that made him feel instantly dirty and ashamed. Peter felt himself spluttering again, utterly unable to articulate a response to the lewd suggestion.

**You’d beg him to capture every inch of you through the lens. I bet the thought of him watching you later, when he’s sat alone in his big, empty office and touching himself, would send sick jolts of pleasure down your spine.**

Peter let out a small moan as he read the message, and he wasn’t sure if it was a moan of despair or of something darker, more primal. Despite himself, he felt another _pulse_ as the fantasy took root in his mind, his thoughts dissolving into a hazy pulp as his tongue darted out to brush against dry lips.

The instant Peter realised what was happening, his mind snapped out of it and he physically jerked backwards. The intense rush of self-loathing followed moments later, and his fingernails dug into the palm of his hand hard enough to draw blood. He was panting audibly and he had trouble raising his eyes to meet the camera as the shame spiralled through him, hating himself anew for his perversion.

His blackmailer had definitely done that on purpose.

**Since you’re already sick enough to want to fuck Tony Stark, you won’t mind putting on a little show.**

At last, Peter’s voice came back to him. “No-” he sputtered, casting one desperate look at himself stood in his boxers in the changing room mirror. Another glance at his thin, frail-looking body was a reminder of just how mortifed Peter would feel if someone like Mr. Stark were to ever see him fully naked.

The resolve hardened in Peter’s stomach. He wasn’t going to risk his naked photos being released for the world to see. He just wasn’t.

“I’m not doing it. That’s final.”

**You are going to regret saying no to me, little worm.**

Peter raised his chin in defiance and glared down at the camera.

“Do your worst.”

He regretted it the moment he had said the words, but by then it was already too late.

The screen of the phone switched and began dialling Mr. Stark’s number. The phone rang for barely a second before facetime was activated, the camera flicking on and Peter’s video feed appearing on screen. Within split seconds of Peter registering the image of himself clad in his red boxer-briefs – clad in _only_ his red boxer-briefs – the call connected and Mr. Stark’s face appeared on his iphone. 

Peter _shrieked_ – there was no other word for it – and immediately snatched the phone up to face level, praying that he hadn’t just exposed himself to Mr. Stark in his goddamn underwear.

“Hi Mr. Stark,” he panted out before the older man could say anything, “Ugh that was just a miss-dial, I’m sorry.”

Peter’s excuse sounded hollow to his own ears and he was positive his face had just turned a crimson to match the boxers he was wearing, the boxers _that Mr. Stark had just seen him in_. His heart hammered in his chest like he had just stepped off of the edge of a building, like he was in freefall and the ground was rushing up to meet him at any second. He choked out a shaky breath and tried not to let the panic or the mortification show on his face as Mr. Stark shot him a puzzled look, seemingly at a loss for words.

After a moment’s pause, he settled on something to say.

“Why aren’t you in school?”

Peter winced at the question and scratched at the back of his head, his arm moving up in a jerky, erratic motion. The boy cursed himself for how awkward the movement must have looked and tried not to let the embarrassment show as his mind raced for an excuse.

“Uh… field trip?” he finally said, his voice rising up at the end as if he had asked a question. Peter let out an involuntary whimper and then had to clamp down on his lips to stop any more sounds coming out.

Mr. Stark looked at him skeptically, raising one eyebrow.

“A field trip to… the mall? I can see you’re in a changing room Peter.”

Peter felt his face heat, knowing there was no way Mr. Stark was buying it. He briefly cast his mind around for a better excuse but his brain chose that moment to cut out, turning to jelly beneath Mr. Stark’s disbelieving stare.

Peter eventually mumbled out a “Mhmmm!” in what he hoped was a convincing voice. He wasn’t sure if the pause before he had spoken had been as ungodly long as it had seemed in his head, or whether the nervous adrenaline flooding his system was making his perception of time dilate.

There was another pause where the two just looked at each other before Tony coughed.

“Ok kid, you’re gonna have to come up with something better than to tell your unusually attractive Aunt. In fact, maybe I should drop her a call and see what she has to say about your little excursion,” he said, his tone sounding authoritative but with a slight undertone of amusement.  

Peter felt his cheeks heat again as he sputtered, looking for some excuse he could give or some way to keep Mr. Stark from contacting Aunt May. After a few moments of frantic thought, he threw dignity to the wind and decided to beg.

“No Mr. Stark, please,” he whined, holding the phone a little higher so he could gaze up at the camera with pleading eyes. His hand gave a nervous jolt as he gripped the phone and Peter had to pray that he hadn’t just flashed Mr. Stark another shot of him in his boxers.

The man paused for a second, as if contemplating.

“I was your age once kid, I remember how it was. But you still shouldn’t be ditching,” he began, adopting his usual lecturing tone. Peter felt his face blush deeper as Mr. Stark continued, and he became painfully aware that he was having a conversation with Mr. Stark _in his boxers_.

Unbidden thoughts started creeping into the teenager’s mind that he tried desperately to quash. 

“You have a bright future ahead of you but if you don’t keep your head down and do the work you’re never going to get anywhere in life. When I was just a tyke-”

Peter gulped nervously and with a rising sense of horror discovered that a new sensation was spreading through him as the lecture continued, a tightly coiled heat unfurling in his stomach.

_Oh god jesus fuck no_.

He didn’t want to admit it, but despite his efforts he was starting to _tent_.

He had to end this conversation and he had to end it now.

“I won’t ditch again Mr. Stark, I know how important school is!” he interrupted, hoping Mr. Stark would accept his plea. Peter knew his eyes must look desperate at this point, as he prayed to whatever god was out there that Mr. Stark would just stop talking and end the call.

The older male contemplated him a second, weighing him up.

“You’re a good kid Peter, you just need someone to keep you on the straight and narrow.”

Peter nodded solemnly as he tried his best to look earnest for the camera, hoping to appear like he had taken Mr. Stark’s advice on board.

“Thankyou Mr. Stark,” he said in a level voice, praying that it sounded sincere. His dick throbbed as the words left his lips, his mind flashing to that same sentence uttered in a hundred other, more illicit, contexts.

God, he was going to hell.

“Anyway kid, I was actually meaning to contact you. Well I was gonna get Happy to do it, but I may as well tell you now since you’re on the line. We’ve picked up word of something in your area, and you’ll need to come to the tower. Does tonight work?”

Peter paused for a second before answering, his mind abruptly switching gears. Had he heard Mr. Stark correctly? Was he finally about to get invited on another mission with the Avengers?

He didn’t want to get ahead of himself, but Peter felt a small jolt of excitement take root in his stomach. He had been waiting for an opportunity like this for months, and he wasn’t going to let something as stupid as his blackmailer blow it.

“Of course Mr. Stark, I’ll do anything you need!” he said eagerly, before his own ears heard the sentence that had just come out of his lips. Peter’s eyes widened and his face flashed from “oh fuck” to “maybe he didn’t notice” to “please dear god I hope that didn’t sound as sexual to Mr. Stark as I think it did.” His expression finally settled on an awkward smile, punctuated with flushed cheeks and a few too many teeth.

Mr Stark was giving him another confused look, and Peter swallowed nervously as he waited for the man to say something.

 “Great, you can drop by around 8.”

Peter nodded, making a humming noise to show his approval. He didn’t trust himself to talk after the last sentence his mind had supplied.

“Oh, and kid?” Mr. Stark continued, and Peter noticed with a twist of dread in his stomach that the older man’s eyes were now glinting with something that looked suspiciously like mischief.

“Yes Mr. Stark?” Peter replied in a voice that was several octaves higher than his usual register, gulping nervously at the end of the sentence.

“Love the Iron Man boxers,” he finished with a wink before the screen cut out.

Peter gaped, the comment failing to parse for several desperate seconds of wilful ignorance. Then it dawned on Peter what Mr. Stark had just said and he felt the heat of an inferno rise to his cheeks.

He wanted to die. He wanted to fucking _die_. That was it. There was no coming back from this. Mr. Stark had caught a glimpse of him in his fucking underwear, his red boxer briefs, the ones with-

Peter shuddered as the cringe washed over him, reaching unbearable levels.

Mr. Stark had seen him in his underwear long enough to recognise the little iron man cartoons repeated geometrically across the fabric. His stomach jolted with the thought, feeling like he’d left it back out in the running apparel aisle.

Peter’s back hit the wall of the cubicle and he began to sink, the floor rising up to meet him as he let out a desperate whimper. He rested his head in his hands, doing everything he could to purge the last five minutes from his memory. Did this kind of shit happen to normal people, or was Peter just cursed to be perpetually humiliated?

As if in answer to his question, his phone vibrated with a new message.

**If you make me call him again, I’ll play him one of your confessions.**

Peter sighed quietly to himself as he sat there, taking a moment to gather his scattered thoughts. Once he felt a little steadier, he propped himself back up, rising to stand on shaky legs.

He should have known better than to challenge his blackmailer like that. He should have known better than to give him another excuse. The stakes were too high, and he couldn’t afford another punishment.

This was really going to suck.

Peter did his best not to think about it as he thrust a hand down the front of his boxers, making sure everything was covered from view. With his other hand he slowly began to slide the material down his legs until the red fabric was pooled around his ankles.

Peter’s cheeks burned as he stepped out of the boxers. This was it, then. He was naked.

He tried desperately to ignore the fact that every second of this was being recorded as he began to redress.

With his other hand, Peter picked up the light grey compression tights and began planning how he would get them on without accidentally flashing his phone and (possibly) the entire Nike store. He stepped his right foot into the first leg hole, pulling the lycra up until it rested over his ankle. He manoeuvred his hand to stretch out the other leg hole so he could step into it with his left foot, thankful that his enhanced balance was making the job a little easier than it otherwise would have been.

With the fabric around both ankles and one hand still covering himself, he began pulling up the small compression tights with short, jerky motions. Peter swore as he yanked the fabric up his legs with his one free hand, the task feeling painfully slow. Inches of progress were the result of minutes’ work and Peter had to fight back the growing levels of frustration as he fought desperately to get the clothes on his body.

After another minute of awkward and frantic tugging, the tights were up past his knees and coming up to thigh level. Peter was growing more and more frustrated as the grey fabric failed to give enough to fit round his thighs, and part of him wondered if he should forego modesty and just yank the damn things up with both hands.

Another minute of struggling and he’d managed to get the tights to mid-thigh. Peter clenched his teeth as he used more superhuman strength than he should have needed to yank them up to below his butt.

He paused for breath, panting after his exertion. His free hand brushed the sweat off his forehead and he had to bite back a string of curses directed at his blackmailer for not letting him get even one size up in the compression gear. Without his superhuman strength, there was simply no way he would’ve even been able to get the tights up this far.

Peter took in a shuddering breath and steeled himself to get the last bit over with. He tugged at the back of the tights as hard as he could, pulling them to try and get them past the mound of his ass. He was hardly endowed in that department, but the compression tights were made to fit a 13-year-old and Peter definitely had more mass to deal with than a boy just starting puberty.

With a final wrench, he managed to get the tights up and over his butt cheeks. He yanked the front of the tights up to his hips and bared his teeth in a grimace of angry triumph, hands dropping to his sides now that his privates were finally covered.

Peter caught sight of himself in the mirror and his train of thought abruptly derailed.

“Oh god,” he whispered as he studied his reflection. That was- that was _fucking indecent._

He could see every line of his package outlined in the grey material, every vein, even the ridge of his cockhead was showing through the compression tights. It was beyond humiliating, the kind of outfit that looked even more obscene than being naked. Peter’s eyebrows knit together in horror as he looked at himself, a soft moan escaping his lips before he could stop it.

**Perfect**.

Peter’s hands shot out to cover himself as the phone vibrated, reminding him that he had an audience. He felt humiliated and exposed beyond all comprehension, like he had hit a new low, a new level of shame that his mind was struggling to accept without declaring cognitive bankruptcy.  

He twisted his body to take a look at his rear, and felt his cheeks burn even hotter as his butt came into view. The mounds were perfectly chiselled in the tight material, the cleft and dimples showing clearly through the stretched lycra. The back of the tights barely reached past the top of his ass crack, and Peter hoped to god the tights wouldn’t start to ride lower on his hips the longer he wore them. Peter could barely believe that this was his body displayed in such a goddamn obscene way-

**Put the top on too Peter.**

The teenager had to drag his eyes away from his reflection as he read the next message, a grim terror settling over him. It was all starting to feel surreal, like this couldn’t really be happening to him, like there was no way that the shy, geeky science nerd Peter Parker was being made to parade his body around in some of the tightest clothing he had ever seen.

The pressure in his chest was building, and Peter was beginning to notice his body reacting to the humiliation in a way that was making him feel more and more uneasy. It felt like something innocent inside of him was being defiled, like what was happening was leaving as strong a mark on his psyche as any physical torture would have on his body, and the longer he let it continue the more of him was being twisted into something he didn’t like. He couldn’t find words to describe the sensation except that it made him feel horribly weak and pathetic, like he was descending lower and lower down the food chain to subhuman levels, like his identity was being washed away and replaced with whatever fucked up thing his blackmailer was turning him into.

“What are you doing to me,” he said as he met his own eyes in the mirror, for a second feeling like he didn’t even recognise the person staring back at him.

Peter dropped his gaze down to the orange compression top and tried his best to put the thoughts out of his mind. He held it up to his chest and winced as he saw that the fabric was barely more than half the width of his torso, and he wondered again whether it would be possible to get his body in it.

Deciding that he might as well get started, Peter stretched the fabric over his head and pulled the top down, the tight material scraping over his ears before it settled around his neck. Peter contorted himself until he could stick one arm inside the material and he searched around before he found the arm hole, his hand sliding through all the way up until the sleeve caught on his shoulder.

The second arm would be the difficult one, Peter knew. He reached up with his other arm and moved it inside the body of the top, already feeling the stretch from the fabric being forced over his shoulders. He twisted his arm past what a normal human would have managed as he found the second hole, forcing the appendage through until the material was snug around his shoulder.

Somehow, he’d managed to get both arms in without ripping the tee.

With his hands now free, Peter pulled the hem of the top down as far as he could across his abs, groaning in frustration when the fabric stopped around his navel. He tried to pull the top down even further, to cover himself even more, but each time he pulled it down the material would ride back up and leave him with an inch of skin showing between the top of the compression tights and the bottom hem of the shirt.

Peter looked at his reflection and groaned, his cheeks flushing fiercely as he took in the full picture of what his blackmailer was forcing him to wear. Every ridge, every line, every muscle was outlined, nothing was left to the imagination, absolutely nothing. Peter twisted his torso to the left and to the right, flushing deeper as the shirt rode up even more, revealing two inches of flesh around his middle rather than just one.

Peter fucking _hated_ this outfit, there were no redeeming qualities to it. He looked ridiculous, and it was painful to see his reflection. Maybe if he had more muscles or a more masculine shape then it would have looked good, but as he glanced at himself in the mirror, all Peter could see was the small, too-thin 5 foot 8 boy with gangly limbs and the kind of body that no one would ever find sexually appealing staring back at him, every inch of him on display.

He bit his lip uncomfortably and felt the blush start spreading to his ears. The longer he looked at himself, the more fucking naked he felt. His clothes were so tight that they were obviously not being worn for sporting purposes, it looked like he was trying to flaunt his body, like he was purposefully displaying it all. Peter looked like the kind of guy who was looking for _attention_ in this outfit, like a –

He looked like a fucking slut.

Peter prayed to the heavens that no one he knew ever saw him wearing those clothes.

**Go out to the front counter and ask the clerk what he thinks of your outfit.**

Peter gulped as he read the message and looked back at himself in the mirror. He felt his cheeks heat even more and was embarrassed to find that his eyes were starting to water from the intense shame he felt burning in his stomach, just picturing what was about to happen.

**Oh and pick up an armband to strap your iphone into, the handheld camera schtick is getting old.**

He felt the energy drain out of him as he looked at the texts.

“Please,” he said in a voice that sounded more empty than anything else. “I can’t let anyone see me like this.”

Peter twisted so he could see himself from behind again, and had to swallow back the bile rising in his throat. A low, guttural moan came out of his mouth before he could stop it.

“Please.”

**You’d better get used to it Peter.**

Peter struggled to tear his eyes away from his body, the blood still painting his cheeks a blotchy red. He caught a glimpse of his eyes in the mirror and had to drop his gaze, not liking the ugly emotions he saw swirling around in them.

Peter collapsed onto the stool in the changing room, taking a moment to pull himself together. His hands gripped the seat tight enough to make his fingers ache, and he seriously considered just saying ‘fuck it’ and refusing to do what his blackmailer wanted.

He tried to talk himself up to it, tell himself it wouldn’t be as bad as he thought it was.

He didn’t feel any better when the next text came through.

**Tick tock Peter.**  

He stood up from the stool, his legs feeling a little shaky as he got to his feet. He picked up his phone and took a deep breath to steady himself.

Trying his best not to look at his reflection, Peter exited the cubicle.

He cast a furtive glance around the store and felt his stomach drop as he noticed a few other customers had entered during his time in the cubicle.  He tried not to meet the eyes of the middle-aged woman browsing the hockey gear as he walked over to the counter.

He stopped a few feet away from the clerk and had to make a conscious effort not to use his hands to cover himself. He knew it would just draw attention to his clothes, and that was the last thing he needed right now.

Peter slowly raised his eyes to meet the clerk’s, and nervously cleared his throat.

“Hi,” he said in a voice so quiet that the clerk only raised an eyebrow, obviously not hearing what Peter had said.

He swallowed and tried again.

“Hi, ermm-”

Peter’s mouth suddenly felt incredibly dry. He tried to ask what the clerk thought of his outfit, but the words just wouldn’t pass his lips.

“Did you need my help with… something?” the clerk asked after the silence had stretched on a few moments. The way the man lingered on the word ‘something’ made Peter’s blush darken. The clerk’s eyes briefly flicked down the front of Peter’s body and the urge to cover himself became almost overwhelming.

“What do you, errr, think-” Peter swallowed past a lump in his throat, trying to force the words out.

After another pause, he gave up and changed tack mid-sentence.

“-is the best arm holster for my phone? For, ermm, running?”

The man smiled knowingly at him, the expression approaching a smirk.

“Follow me, I can show you the ones I like,” he said in a voice so smooth and collected that it made Peter feel even more uneasy. He waited until the man was in front of him and began to follow, eager not to give him a view of his outfit from behind.

The man led him to a display on the other side of the store and Peter kept his eyes down as he passed by a group of three male teens, probably a year or two younger than him. He heard snickering and felt his cheeks heat even more, certain that they must be laughing at him.

“Here we go,” the clerk said, coming to a stop near the front of the store. The display was far enough from the aisles that the rest of the store had a clear line of sight to his whole body, and Peter had to wonder if the clerk had intentionally put Peter on display.

Peter swallowed. The day was making him paranoid.

The man turned to him and his eyes scanned up and down Peter’s body again before he spoke. “Any of these will do,” he said, gesturing at the display behind him. He quirked an eyebrow up at Peter before his next sentence.

“Do you see something you like?”

Peter gulped, his mouth tasting like cotton. He broke eye contact with the clerk, conscious of the nervous bubbling in the pit of his stomach.

He glanced up at the display and pointed to the first arm band he saw on the rack.

“That one,” he said quietly, struggling to meet the clerk’s eyes.

“Great choice. You want to try it on?”

“Ermm, I guess so.”

The man smirked again at Peter, and for a moment he felt like a guppy staring into the mouth of a shark. Peter started to feel dizzy.

The man maintained eye contact as he reached up and picked out a box, his long, tan fingers deftly unclasping the tape and opening the packet. Moments later he had the arm band pulled out of the packaging, and one of his strong hands was reaching out to lock around Peter’s arm.

“Here,” he said as he made contact with Peter’s skin, and the teenager sucked in a breath before he could stop himself. The man’s hands felt firm and huge as they bounded the top of Peter’s thin arm, and Peter’s stomach did a weird flip as he registered the sensation. For a horrifying second, Peter felt himself start to react to the guy’s touch.

Oh fuck no, this was not going to happen to him. Not in the middle of a goddamn store wearing thin grey compression tights.

Peter bit into his lip and tasted blood, doing anything he could to distract himself from the sensation of the man strapping the holster around the top of Peter’s arm. His touch was firm and persistent, and the feeling of being strapped in to the holster was sending Peter’s mind into analogous situations involving stronger types of restraints.

The man gestured for Peter’s phone and he handed it to him without a thought. Moments later the man had the phone strapped in to the arm band and was flashing Peter another grin.

Peter swallowed as he met the man’s stare, knowing it was now or never. Thankfully, he had been given an opportunity to make the question far less embarrassing than it otherwise would have been.

“How do I look?” he said, turning slightly to emphasize the arm band and make it clear that he wasn’t seeking an appraisal of any of the other items he was wearing.

“Hmmmmm…” the clerk said in a playful voice, his eyes scouring over Peter’s entire body. The teenager felt his chest tighten as he abruptly stopped turning, suddenly feeling incredibly awkward in the situation.

“I think you look like you’re ready to break a sweat,” the man finally answered, and then winked at Peter.

Fucking _winked_.

Peter felt the blush spear down his neck, and something else _throbbed_ despite himself. He felt even more light headed and Peter knew with a sinking feeling of dread in his stomach that he needed to get back to the changing room _now_.

“Th- thanks,” he sputtered out before turning to walk as fast as he could back to the changing room, trying not to think about the fact that he’d just given the clerk a clear shot of his rear. He paced down one of the empty aisles and found his way back to the changing cubicles, breathing heavily like he had just sprinted the length of a city block. He felt a small sigh of relief well up in him as he stepped inside the cubicle and pulled the curtain shut behind him, feeling his back hit the wall as he sagged in relief.

_What the fuck?!_

Peter eyes snapped open in surprise as he looked down at the changing room.

“Where the fuck are my clothes?” his mouth opened before he could stop it, and he swore loudly again as he realised his bag, wallet and keys were missing too. He pulled open the curtain and looked back out into the store, eyes darting around to see if they had been moved anywhere or someone was in the process of stealing them.

The clerk was ringing up something for the middle aged woman by the tills, but there was no one else inside the store. Swearing again, Peter checked inside all of the other cubicles but they were all empty, not a shred of his stuff could be found anywhere.

He found himself back in the cubuicle at the end with his heart pounding, wondering what the fuck he should do. Had it been the teenagers who had laughed at him earlier? Was it his blackmailer? Had he somehow managed to orchestrate this, taking Peter’s clothes and bag away from him while he was preoccupied?

Peter snapped the phone out of the arm holster and began typing a furious text. He wasn’t more than three words in before his blackmailer’s message came through.

**Time to leave the store Peter.**

Peter growled and decided it was quicker to speak than it was to type.

“All my stuff is GONE. Did you take it?”

**Leave the store.**

“I need my stuff back,” he whined, looking around desperately as if his bag would magically appear before him.

**Now, Peter.**

“I can’t, I don’t have my fucking wallet to pay for these clothes!” he said, his heart still pounding in his chest.

**You can either leave the store in those clothes or you can leave it naked. Your choice.**

Peter gulped and made his decision.


End file.
